Fuel Cell Advantages And Disadvantages

1196 Words5 Pages
Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION Overview Of Fuel Cells A fuel cell is an environmentally clean , energy conversion device that converts the chemical energy of a fuel gas (hydrogen) directly to electrical energy and heat when it combines with oxygen from the air. It ensures higher conversion rates and better efficiencies than thermal and mechanical processes. That is because there is no intermediate step of direct combustion. Fuel cells have the same operating principle as batteries in which there is electrochemical combination of a fuel gas(hydrogen) and an oxidant gas(oxygen from air) for the generation of electricity. This combination occurs between two electrodes via an electrolyte. But the advantage of fuel cell is that unlike batteries, it doesn’t run out or need recharging. A fuel cell is able to run as long as the electrolyte is present and the oxidant is provided to the electrode[1]. Types of fuel cells (1) Alkaline Fuel Cell (AFC) (2) Phosphoric Acid Fuel Cells (PAFC) (3) Molten Carbonate Fuel Cell(MCFC) (4) Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) (5) Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (SOFC) Advantages Of Fuel Cells As the fuel cell is basically a device of conversion of energy and is used to convert a gaseous fuel like hydrogen into electrical energy and generate heat. This conversion takes place by the process of electrochemical…show more content…
However, Swiss scientist Baur and his colleague Preis[7] finally decided the composition for electrolytic material and they used to experiment with SOFCs using materials such as lanthanum, yttrium, zirconia etc. The materials used by them was composed of lithium zirconate, clay and Nernst-Mass (30% lithium zirconate, 10% clay and 60% Nernst-Mass (85% ZrO2 and 15% Y2O3). But , it was observed that this material was too costly so it couln’t be put to use commercially in any fuel cell

More about Fuel Cell Advantages And Disadvantages

Open Document